Mazda, Toyota Building 2022 Corolla Cross in Alabama

Mazda Toyota Manufacturing (MTM) and 2,000 non-unionized workers have celebrated the start of production of the all-new 2022 Corolla Cross. MTM, the only North American facility to produce the Corolla Cross, is a joint-venture between Mazda Motor Corporation and Toyota Motor Corporation in Alabama. The plant continues to hire in preparation for production of the as-yet-to-be-announced Mazda vehicle.

Alabama, aside from its history of racism and white supremacy, is a right to work*” (for less?) state, which means workers don’t have to be unionized.** Want to bet the Mazda will be a crossover, with maybe a sub-line for a hybrid and or EV? Toyota is vehemently lobbying against the Biden Administration’s ambitious Build Back Better plan that has a provision for made in American by union workers to be eligible for substantial taxpayer-subsidized EV subsidies. This is part of a forward-thinking strategic plan to create middle-class jobs and benefits from the Administration that was put in place by a majority of voters to rid our democracy of the treasonous former Administration still being led from Trump Castle in Mar-a-Lago (Mar-a-Lardo?) that promoted the January 6 insurrection attempt to take over the US Capital and overturn the Presidential election, aka Big Lie.

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*Alabama Right to Work: “Every organization, association, group, union, lodge, local, branch or subdivision thereof, whether incorporated or not, having within its membership employees working in the State of Alabama, organized for the purpose of dealing with employer or employers concerning hours of employment, rates of pay or the tenure or other terms or conditions of employment, but such term or terms shall not include any labor organization or labor union the members of which are subject to the Act of Congress known as the Railway Labor Act. (Enacted 1943 and excerpted here.)

 ** On 10 June 1963, President John F. Kennedy federalized National Guard troops and deployed them to the University of Alabama to force its desegregation. The next day, Governor Wallace yielded to the federal pressure, and two African American students—Vivian Malone and James A. Hood—successfully enrolled. In September of the same year, Wallace again attempted to block the desegregation of an Alabama public school – this time Tuskegee High School – but President Kennedy once again employed his executive authority and federalized National Guard troops. Wallace had little choice but to yield. Courtesy of History.com. More under Segregation in the United States.